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To: Douglas Nordgren who started this subject8/9/2001 12:29:21 AM
From: Douglas Nordgren of 4808
 
Aberdeen Group: FalconStor's IPStor

http://www.aberdeen.com/2001/research/07012564.asp
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FalconStor Software: Easy Upgrade to the Storage Utility

Preface

Today, as the repository for an enterprise's proprietary content that allows the e-Business to achieve Web differentiation, storage is bottom-line-affecting infrastructure - but managing rapidly growing storage has become a Herculean task. Proliferation of unconnected storage systems and accumulation of "legacy" heterogeneous storage lead to complex storage architectures. These, in turn, cause administration costs to scale linearly with the growth of storage, draining funds and Information Systems (IS) resources sorely needed elsewhere.

The long-term answer to this problem is the storage utility: an overall storage architecture that makes storage appear to servers and users as one "storage entity," with one administrative interface and one data-access method - to which any storage device may be added transparently and seamlessly. By hiding the complexities of the architecture, and by allowing administrators to apply one comprehensive policy to all of storage, the storage utility will cut storage administrative costs to a minimum. But how do we get there from here?

A good storage-utility migration solution must offer the following:

1. Storage virtualization - a software "veneer" that makes all storage appear as one logical pool to administrators and users;
2. NAS-SAN convergence - the ability to combine the two most common types of networked storage, network attached storage (NAS) and storage area network (SAN) storage, into one harmonious whole - all of them treated regardless of their attachment protocol as block-oriented peripherals; and
3. Standards to ensure support for all types of storage and server connections - especially support for the IP networking protocol.

This Aberdeen Profile describes FalconStor Software's IPStor. IPStor software, embedded at many levels - SAN switches, storage servers, storage switches, and/or in storage subsystems, for example - can create a virtualized storage utility that runs over standard IP networks and provides a common umbrella for NAS and SAN. IPStor's ability to encompass and link LAN (local area network), data center, and Web site storage should allow IS to take its greatest steps yet toward taming the storage-administration-cost monster.

Executive Summary

FalconStor's IPStor is storage "add-on" software that includes IPStor Server (virtualization software running on a thin Linux-based embedded platform between host LAN/server hardware and a target pool of storage) plus IPStor SAN Clients (disk-access speed-up software running on LAN desktops and server hardware). The SAN storage and NAS volumes created are virtual, and both can be created or altered in capacity or assignment dynamically. IPStor Server includes a Java-based console; storage management tools such as online serverless backup/restore, local and remote mirroring, point-in-time copy services, and an "undo" rollback feature; and separate software stacks for both NAS and SAN access. IPStor's innovative architecture minimizes its overhead on storage access - and in some cases performs disk accesses faster than existing systems.

IPStor connects to all major Unix and Windows NT LANs and servers, as well as all major storage devices, using the IP protocol. And IPStor can connect legacy devices that use the small computer system interface (SCSI) or Fibre Channel (FC), and will be able to connect devices that use iSCSI, proposed as a standard IP-based FC replacement, or Infiniband, the proposed computer PCI bus replacement - without using a special hardware converter box. IPStor provides SNMP support that allows systems management framework solutions such as CA's Unicenter TNG, Tivoli's TMG, or HP's OpenView to mesh with IPStor storage management tools.

End-users can buy and install IPStor directly. Also, FalconStor delivers IPStor via indirect channels, and emphasizes OEM and system integrator/VAR partnerships that allow users to employ IPStor as a complement to existing storage solutions. Embedding IPStor would be the task of original equipment manufacturers (OEMs). Knowledgeable Information Technology (IT) executives would simply look for the FalconStor brand "IPStor inside" when they choose to acquire equipment.

Aberdeen research shows that storage-solution characteristics such as performance/scalability, robustness, open flexibility, and manageability are critical success factors in any organization's storage strategy. FalconStor's IPStor, effectively implemented, can deliver fundamental and ongoing improvements to disk-access performance, robustness, and manageability, thus leading to bottom-line administrative cost savings.

Users will find IPStor particularly effective in situations in which they need to make storage assigned as NAS and SANs work together effectively, where they need to extend a single approach to storage administration across all enterprise storage, or where they wish to rationalize their storage architectures in order to provide broader access to competitive-advantage data or drive down administrative costs. Because these situations are so common, ISVs and IS buyers of all stripes should give IPStor careful consideration.

Three Keys to Storage Utility Success

Aberdeen research shows that three additions to an enterprise's existing storage infrastructure take a company a long way toward achieving the benefits of a storage utility:

1. Storage virtualization;
2. Leveraging IP networking; and
3. NAS-SAN convergence.

Storage Virtualization

Virtualization separates the representation of storage to the server operating system from actual physical storage. This division of physical storage devices from the logical storage space presented to users and applications turns storage into a generally available utility pool. Virtualization fulfills a role for storage similar to that which an operating system does for a computer system - namely, making programming and operation simpler by automating resource management "housekeeping." When this process occurs, computer users are said to be "viewing its resources at a higher level of abstraction." Thus, in short, virtualization is the abstraction of storage.

Both the concept and the process have great potential benefits for storage administration because they allow administering of storage with the same tools and treatment of storage in a consistent manner, using policy-based (not case-by-case) decisions and actions that automatically handle activities such as load balancing, adding storage, and migrating data. Aberdeen research indicates that storage administrative and management personnel costs can easily become out of control and dominate storage total cost of ownership (TCO). Storage virtualization dramatically increases the amount of storage an administrator can manage in the same amount of time, or slashes the work necessary to manage the same amount of storage.

Leveraging Existing IP Networks and In-House Skill Sets

Up to now, users have been reluctant to use IP as their storage network protocol because of perceived performance slowdowns and security concerns. IPStor does not require end-users to convert any existing SAN storage to IP. Rather, IPStor makes it easy for users to build out a SAN infrastructure that leverages IP, and in which existing storage devices, including FC SANs, can participate without conversion or retrofit. Security is handled with an active measure using a key-based authentication scheme to eliminate unwelcome access. This is very different from SAN security with passive logical unit number (LUN) masking or [soft] zoning. LUN masking and [soft] zoning are filtering methods and are not totally effective against "spoofing" - wherein a host computer improperly claims access to a LUN or zone. Should such improper access be granted, stored data will be made corrupt, and restoring the data will leave it vulnerable until the "spoofer" is identified and the underlying problem corrected.

Aberdeen research shows that IP performance is at least as good as the alternatives, and security concerns are readily handled. As the historical reasons for administrators' preferring FC versus SCSI, Ethernet, and IP vanish, the advantages of IP as a common network-layer protocol that can run on Ethernet come to the fore:

- Using IP as a common LAN and SAN protocol allows LAN and SAN administration with a common interface, and lets the same administrator handle both networks? management.
- IP is the most common global network-layer protocol in the world today, and is the protocol for the Internet. Therefore, administrators' training costs are reduced, and the effort of connecting storage with the rest of the enterprise and with outside firms via the Internet is greatly eased.
- IP is a non-proprietary standard with 30 years of global use. It is exceptionally robust and flexible and avoids vendor "lock-in."

NAS-SAN Convergence

NAS and SAN are two different networked storage architectures for two very different purposes. NAS "filers" are special-purpose file servers, "appliances" that attach to a LAN and deliver files to client systems. A NAS filer lets clients share files but does not share its storage with other servers.

SAN storage connects to multiple servers through a separate storage area network, not via the LAN. Servers access the files contained in SAN storage using basic block I/O commands ? just as if the storage were part of the server - not by calling for files. However, while a SAN does not (usually) offer file sharing, it does offer storage sharing to servers. Also, the SAN provides a high-speed data path between server and storage independent of the LAN.

A SAN is good for storing dynamic structured content, for providing LAN-free backup, and for enabling very expensive tape library systems commonly used for backup to be shared. NAS has been good for providing cross-platform access to files or for providing static file content to the Web.

Aberdeen research indicates that storage administrative and management personnel costs could easily become out of control and dominate storage TCO if administrators are forced to view and manage NAS and SAN separately.

As the amount of information and number of files in an enterprise's treasure trove of stored digital assets climbs, so does the complexity of the storage network - because, typically, NAS and SAN storage must be managed separately, even though they often store related information. Therefore, managing those information assets as a whole and giving uniform access to qualified end-users becomes ever more difficult - and storage-administration costs increase at a startling rate. Unifying networked storage - allowing storage devices in the pool to be dynamically and non-disruptively assigned to act either as NAS or as SAN - could drive these digital asset delivery and management costs downward. A prerequisite for doing this is storage virtualization software to bridge NAS and SAN administration, plus IP-based storage networking support to connect them via a common network.

Technology Overview: IPStor's Three-in-One

IPStor includes implementations of the "three keys to the storage utility" described above:

1. IPStor Server, virtualization software that carries out key storage-management functions such as monitoring, backup/restore, mirroring, and snapshot rollback;
2. Support for IP connectivity to IP/Ethernet LANs, and to IP-supporting servers;
3. Separate software stacks that allow management of both NAS and SAN storage, with a common administrative view from a common Java-based console.

Critical to IPStor's ability to merge these three technologies successfully is the cleverly designed IPStor architecture (Figure 1).

Figure 1: IPStor Unified, Virtualized SAN/NAS SCSI, FC, IP, iSCSI Storage
http://www.aberdeen.com/ab_research/2001/07/07012564/07012564-1.gif

IPStor running on an embedded Linux platform in the storage network handles the tasks of storage management and mediating servers/desktops and storage. In effect, this architecture ensures that all server-to-storage traffic passes through IPStor, guaranteeing that administrators get a global view of storage and providing a "many-to-one, one-to-many" design that requires little upgrade to handle new types of servers or storage.

The historical argument for the weakness of such a design has always been that a single point of access has typically been a performance bottleneck. IPStor gets around this by placing IPStor SAN Client software at the server/desktop end and by allowing multiple IPStor servers to be clustered as a group. This software bypasses the operating system running on the server/desktop when I/O is called for, allowing rapid, "thin-layer" IP transmissions between server/desktop and IPStor Server. In fact, independent testing cited by FalconStor indicates that IPStor can in many cases provide server-to-disk access faster than a direct server-to-disk link.

IPStor runs native IP through SAN/IP, which is FalconStor's kernel-mode Linux implementation. Aberdeen finds this performance result - which FalconStor had verified independently by Extremelabs - entirely believable. In fact, SAN/IP on IPStor runs so efficiently that read and write cache memory are not needed, allowing IPStor to tout its "Zero Memory Copy" feature.

Zero Memory Copy benefits OEMs and system integrators directly and the benefit flows through to end-users. The direct benefit is that by not requiring memory for caching, IPStor minimizes its embedded "footprint," keeping the product in which it is embedded both low cost and more physically compact - which end-users perceive as reduced space required and low price.

High IP-based performance also permits file-oriented IPStor NAS backup to run as swiftly and efficiently as if it were block-oriented SAN backup. Therefore, the NAS storage can be on the SAN as well as - or instead of - being connected to the LAN. The connection decision depends entirely on the user's view of client and server designations.

Aberdeen Criteria: Scalability, Robustness, Flexibility, and Manageability

Aberdeen finds that a good storage utility solution (Figure 1) should provide improvements in scalability, robustness, flexibility, and manageability over existing "storage archipelagoes." Below, we discuss how IPStor's approach can deliver strong results in these areas.

Scalability

Typical barriers to storage-network scalability in today's environments include lack of server-to-disk bandwidth, slow server-to-disk protocols, inability to "parallelize" a stream of storage accesses, and inability to "stripe" data across multiple devices for parallel access. By supporting IP (via Ethernet, FC, or SCSI), IPStor takes advantage of today's highest-bandwidth protocol. IPStor also preserves legacy storage equipment and extends its useful life by supporting FC and SCSI device connectivity.

By providing a common management framework across NAS and SAN, IPStor allows administrators to "stripe" data across a wider array of storage devices, and to access this striped data in a parallel fashion from IPStor Server. Moreover, administrators can begin to "load balance" by moving data across storage elements without downtime.

Robustness

IPStor provides end-to-end redundancy, including the ability to actively mirror IPStor Servers, so that if one IPStor server fails the other takes over the load without missing a beat. IPStor's support for IP means that it can carry out mirroring or replication not only locally but remotely across the Web - giving users the option of outsourcing their entire storage management without moving the storage infrastructure a fraction of an inch, and without co-locating the service provider in their facilities.

IPStor's online backup/restore ensures that administrators do not need to bring down all enterprise systems in order to carry out backup on one globally accessed storage device. And because IPStor Server does not reside on the server, it can carry out "serverless" backup directly from one storage device to another, removing major performance overhead from servers and server-to-disk buses.

Placed in parallel, IPStor offers "N-way" "active-active" failover. Any failing unit's work is taken up automatically by any and all operating units. The only limitation is, of course, throughput should too many units fail over to too few.

Flexibility

IPStor is a major advance in flexibility - it not only provides storage management software that handles all major types of storage and servers, but also supports the widely prevalent, e-facto-Internet-standard IP protocol. As a result, as noted previously, it is relatively easy to add new server types and new storage devices to the mix. Moreover, the ability to use IP for connectivity gives users a much wider array of storage-architecture options: Storage can now be accessed locally, remotely across a MAN (metropolitan area network) or WAN (wide area network), across the Web, and even from outside the enterprise.

In fact, the "strategy" to migrate a storage device into an IPStor virtual storage pool can be as simple as plugging the storage unit's cable into an IPStor unit.

Manageability

IPStor's storage virtualization software lets administrators carry out key storage management functions such as backup/restore, mirroring/replication, point-in-time copy, and undo (rollback), "once for all" across an enterprise's entire storage infrastructure. IPStor's SNMP support allows it to communicate storage-management information to overall systems management solutions, giving system administrators the ability to monitor storage as part of an overall enterprise architecture. IPStor's Java-based Web-browser console allows centralized remote administration of all of an enterprise's storage assets.

Where FalconStor's Solutions Can Be Most Effective

Aberdeen finds that FalconStor's IPStor can be particularly effective where users wish to effectively transform their distributed, direct-attached storage into a centralized/virtualized storage pool. In these cases, there is a straightforward, easy upgrade path that involves linking servers across the enterprise network to IPStor Server, adding IPStor Client software to servers/desktops, and linking IPStor Server to existing clients 3/4 in parallel with existing links, if necessary. Once all of that has been accomplished, users can begin to employ IPStor's administration software to monitor across NAS and SAN, "load balance," and identify content that can be distributed more widely across the enterprise.

While IPStor permits storage to be designated as NAS or SAN, each unit of virtualized storage is exclusively SAN "or" NAS and not both. IPStor does not need to confer file intelligence on SAN storage, or leverage NAS as a SAN metadata controller. However, FalconStor has tested compatibility with SAN sharing applications such as Tivoli SANergy and VERITAS SANPoint Direct to allow files to be shared at SAN speed.

IPStor is also especially useful where enterprises need to establish common storage administration policies and storage views across an enterprise's entire storage infrastructure. IPStor's storage virtualization software provides a firm foundation for enterprisewide storage management, no matter what the device or server type.

Finally, IPStor can be effective where users wish to rationalize their storage architectures. By placing a virtualization "veneer" across heterogeneous storage in NAS and SANs, IPStor can reduce the administrative costs of complexity, or provide information that can be used to drive architectural simplification (e.g., centralizing local storage).

Aberdeen Conclusions

As rapidly growing, heterogeneous storage drives up administrative costs, implementing the storage equivalent of an electrical utility offers IS long-term hope. Aberdeen finds that FalconStor's IPStor is a major step toward the storage utility - one that is relatively painless for implementers, and can yield major side benefits such as increased performance and scalability, greater robustness, increased storage-architecture flexibility, and integrated systems/storage manageability.

In fact, the longer term potential benefits of storage-virtualization solutions like IPStor are as alluring as today's value-add. Building on IPStor's virtualization software, FalconStor can implement "dynamic partitioning" of storage with no single point of failure using multiple IPStor appliances between LAN and data center, or between files and databases, shifting the amount of storage allocated to each as the workload shifts during the day. IPStor information could drive storage architecture design and identify key content for wider dissemination. IPStor's "central point of access" could allow data streaming directly to the user, bypassing server bottlenecks.

FalconStor's main business challenge is to gain critical-mass distribution channel acceptance from OEM and VAR resellers, who must then provide "feet on the street" sales and technical support.

As "legacy" storage continues to proliferate, the value of a solution such as IPStor should continue to grow. Aberdeen recommends that IS buyers seeking a way out of the storage-complexity bind "kick the tires" of FalconStor's IPStor immediately.

This Document is for Electronic Distribution Only
-- REPRODUCTION PROHIBITED --

Copyright © 2001 Aberdeen Group, Inc., Boston, Massachusetts
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